


Eighteen Days

by snapeslittleblackbuttons



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst and Feels, F/M, Heartbreak, Unhappy Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-07
Updated: 2018-03-07
Packaged: 2019-03-28 06:10:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13897941
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/snapeslittleblackbuttons/pseuds/snapeslittleblackbuttons
Summary: The events of Valentine's Day—both past and present—convince Hermione that it's finally time to have a sit down with Harry. Written for the 2018 Platform 9 3/4 "Heartbreak on Valentine's Day" Comp. WINNER: Overall Favorite, Judges Pick, Fanfic Coordinators Pick, Best Feels, Best Angst, Best Overall Characterization, Best Creative Use of Prompt; Runner Up: Best Female Characterization, Tie In.





	Eighteen Days

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: blatant disregard for canon timelines; possible movie scene only reference
> 
> All things Harry Potter belong to J. K. Rowling.

Hermione opened her eyes, allowing the momentary disorientation of the Apparition pass before stepping towards the end of the narrow alley. As she blended into the foot traffic on the street, she garnered an odd look from a passerby, seemingly curious as to why she was emerging from the darkness.

She ignored it.

Couples out for Valentine’s Day dinner brushed by her on the sidewalk, hand in hand or arm in arm, chatting, laughing, smiling. She sighed raggedly. Gods, how long was this day going to pummel her emotions into ash? Would this date forever remind her of both the events of earlier this evening, as well as a chilly Valentine’s Day in a tent a scant year ago?

Likely.

Tendrils of guilt curled around her heart.

She ignored those, too.

An hour earlier, she’d destroyed a man whose only fault was that he wasn’t someone else. And she, Hermione Jean Granger, was not in the business of destroying men, thank-you-very-much. She left that to those better suited to it than she was: Pansy Parkinson, for one.

Ginny Weasley, for another.

Idly, she wondered if she would find Ginny at Harry’s flat. Not for the first time, she hoped Harry would be alone. She needed to talk to her best friend. She needed him…without any distractions.

She wasn’t sure how she’d allowed nine months to slip by, unnoticed, without talking about _this_ to Harry. And she’d allowed her simple presence in Ron’s life to suggest things that were never, ever going to be true.

She didn’t know which of those was worse.

She’d been a fool. A bloody fool.

Gods, now she even _sounded_ like Ron.

She huffed a bitter laugh and kept walking.

_“Hermione, will you—”_

She shook her head to interrupt the echo of Ron’s voice. It wasn’t as if she intended to hurt him—it was just that lately, her timing seemed as bad as Ron’s had ever been.

What an abysmal mess.

_Oh, Ron…_

In less than five minutes, she arrived at Harry’s building and made her way up three flights of stairs. She gathered herself in front of the door to his flat, straightening her scarf and coat before knocking. She had a key, of course, but since Ginny had started spending more nights here—against the Molly’s very public protests—Hermione refused to use it. She had no desire to happen upon _them_ , thank-you-very-much. And while Ginny still technically lived at the Burrow, today _was_ Valentine’s Day after all.

Witnessing something like that was the last thing she needed this evening.

At the sound of her knock, Harry appeared at the door, his hair a bit more disheveled than usual, and his wire glasses too far down his nose. He smiled crookedly at her. “Hey.”

“Hey,” she managed. “You busy?”

“Nope.” He opened the door widely and waived Hermione inside.

“Is Ginny here?”

“She’s at The Burrow.”

Suddenly, tears threatened; she swallowed roughly.

So much for straightening her scarf.

“Hermione,” he muttered, “What’s wrong? What’s happened?”

Just what _had_ happened? What had she done? Or in this case, what _hadn’t_ she done?

“Here. Come in and sit down. I’ll make some tea.” Harry led her to a chair by the fireplace; she managed—just barely—to keep the tears from escaping down her cheek before he disappeared into the other room. He remained in the kitchen while the tea brewed, because, Hermione knew, he was giving her the time she needed to compose herself.

Harry had always known exactly what she needed, hadn’t he?

*****

_The particularly chilly evening had given way to an even colder February night, the damp breeze permeating skin and bone in the way only icy wind could. Tendrils of hopelessness wrapped around her soul in perfect time with the bitter wind assaulting their campsite. The forest seemed to sense—with shocking accuracy—when Hermione’s thoughts were the bleakest._

_Harry ambled out the tent to come and sit next to her on the boulder she had re-warmed only moments ago._

_“You okay?” he asked, keeping his eyes trained on the trees._

_As his breath gathered in a silvery cloud in front of him, Hermione could almost imagine the vapor solidifying into a billow of ice, and falling to shatter at their feet._

_Exactly like their lives…fragile. Cold. Temporary._

_Or maybe that was just the locket talking._

_“Yeah. Sometimes I just need a minute to feel sorry for myself,” she said with a bitter laugh. “Tomorrow is Valentine’s Day, you know.”_

_“I get that.” He put his arm around her, pulled her close for a moment, and then stood. “I’ll be inside.”_

_She fumbled her way into the tent a few short minutes later, rubbing her hands together and shuffling her feet in an effort to regain some semblance of feeling in her fingers and toes._

_“I’ll take it,” Harry said, approaching her and lifting the heavy pendant from her neck. She caught his eye, but he was grim and determined, and she knew if she protested that he would take it from her anyway._

_Hermione curled up in her cot and opened Tales of Beetle the Bard, as she always did, every night. Harry settled in next to her, shrugging a blanket off his shoulders to place it around hers. She smiled softly at him, grateful for his attention._

_How did he know exactly what she needed, precisely when she needed it?_

_Was it that he remembered—long after he had taken the locket off—the bleak things it whispered when he wore it? Did he know it whispered those things to her, too? Was that how he knew exactly when to draw close and when to give her space?_

_Or had he always known everything about her?_

 *****

As Harry returned from the kitchen with two steaming cups of tea, Hermione caught him glancing at her left hand.

“You knew,” she stated flatly.

Harry sighed. “I did. I was with him when he bought it.” He sat down, handed her a cup, and met her eye. “I thought about warning you, but…”

Bitterness rose in her throat. “But…?” She tried to quell the shrill tone in her question, and failed. Was that a hint of hysteria, too? Or accusation?

He ignored all of it. “But Ron swore me to secrecy.”

It was her turn to sigh. She glanced down at the warm mug of tea in her hands, then met his eye. “Harry…”

“I’m sorry, Hermione.”

“Don’t apologize.”

Harry looked away, apparently to study something invisible on the rug between them. “I should have guessed that you would say no.”

“And I should have told you things were not going well.”

“It’s none of my business, really.”

She stared ahead of her at the small sitting room of Harry’s flat, and said nothing for a long while. She imagined what the space would look like—if the _right_ token, new and sparkling, encircled her finger. Would there be a vase of lilies on the side table, a quiet tribute to the mother he never knew? A picture on the wall? Thick curtains buffering the bare windows instead of blinds, or a pillow placed _just so_ on the sofa?

But the room before her had been left wanting; Ginny cared nothing for such trivialities.

“There was a time when it was your business,” she started. “Or a time when it could have been…”

Hermione glanced at him to gage his reaction to her words; his shoulders seemed to sag, his face flushed, and he hung his head. She could see his mess of dark brown hair, unruly as her own. She wanted to reach out and thread her fingers through it; no matter what had happened earlier tonight, or what would happen right now, he was _her_ Harry.

What was this bond between them? This barely spoken, mutual agreement? This near silent… _understanding_ , this something that had always been far more than a promise, but less than a vow?

Did it even exist any longer?

“I know it’s the wrong moment, but…” She swallowed. “We need to talk.”

He spared a look at her then, and she saw that his eyes held more anguish than she had seen in a year.

Perhaps she had misunderstood; perhaps words whispered during war aren’t meant to survive the last battle.

He nodded at the tea in her hand.

“Maybe something stronger is in order,” Harry said, and disappeared, once more, into the kitchen.

*****

_“I could use a Firewhisky,” Hermione joked, turning to catch Harry’s eye. “Or at least a Butterbeer.”_

_Although she hadn’t cast a_ Tempus _, she knew it had gotten quite late. The wood was still and quiet around them; the near constant breeze had vanished, leaving in its wake a blanket of snow cloaking the ground, making everything appear blameless and new._

_Harry huffed a laugh. “Me, too.” He leaned into her, putting his arm around her shoulders. “What is it? What’s wrong?”_

_“I don’t know what to do.”_

_“Come on,” he said, rising and reaching for her hand. “Let’s go inside.”_

_It had become commonplace, his reaching for her. She supposed it afforded Harry as much comfort as it did her; lately, though, Hermione could not imagine being able to survive without his touch. Physical connection between them had become as necessary as air; it seemed to provide a buffer against the false tranquility suggested by the thin, pristine cover of snow._

_Back in the tent, she settled on her cot, as she usually did, and found the book bequeathed to her by the former Headmaster. Its cover had begun to wear thin, flopping open easily now after endless re-reads._

_She was tired of the stories._

_So very tired of the words, so very tired of struggling with meanings that eluded her._

_Before she could find the page she wanted, Harry pulled the book from her hands, snatching it away only to abandon it on the small table next to the cot. Next, he removed the locket with a sigh, discarding it on the table next to the threadbare book, and sat down next to her, his thigh long and solid against hers. He kept his eyes on the space in front of him._

_“Hermione.”_

_She could feel him through her denims, his warmth, his strength. She turned to look at him, questioning, but he kept his eyes ahead._

_“I know you and Ron—“_

_She interrupted with a bitter laugh. “He’s_ gone, _Harry. I don’t think there is a ‘Ron and me’ anymore. In fact, I’m certain there never was.”_

_He was silent for so long, she thought he might not say anything more. Finally, he whispered, “Do you think there could ever be a ‘Harry and me’?”_

_She felt her face flush. She glanced down at her hands, empty and folded on her lap, in case her eyes gave her away. How long had she wanted to hear those words from him?_

_Truthfully? Years._

_He turned to her. The uncertainty etched in his features made her want to weep. How,_ how _could he be unsure of her feelings for him?_

_As he reached out and cupped her jaw in his hand, Hermione let her eyes fall closed. She felt him draw closer, felt his breath graze her cheek, felt his exhale ripple gently through the madness of her hair. In return, she breathed him in, his unlikely scent reminding her of apples and cinnamon and broom polish. It was a musky spiciness that spoke only of Harry, and in that moment, she knew a lifetime would never satisfy her need to taste him, to feel him, to love him._

_She would never be sated._

_“Do you think…would you want…maybe we…?” he stumbled before moving any closer._

_She leaned into his whisper and bent her head so that she felt his ragged breath heavily against her lips. He lingered there, just out of reach, waiting_ _for her permission._

_“Please…”_

_He kissed her then, tentatively brushing his lips against hers. It struck her that his lips were unlike anything she had touched in some time: soft, warm, and tender._

_She opened her eyes. As he gently pulled away, he smiled crookedly at her, with the smile that had charmed her even in the moments when she’d been terribly angry with him._

_“If we live through this…” Harry whispered._

_“If we live through this…” she echoed._

_“I want you. Only you,” he said. “There’s never been anyone but you.”_

_She accepted the lie with surprising ease._

_For a heartbeat, she remembered how Harry’s eyes followed every girl at Hogwarts with straight hair: Cho, Parvati, Ginny…and how Fifth Year, she’d sat for hours trying to master a spell to straighten her curls, so that maybe, just_ maybe _, Harry Potter might notice her._

_She remembered the teasing of her dorm mates, the whispers that accused her of having no friends but boys. Those taunts had only pushed her further away, further towards Harry and Ron—well, especially towards Harry._

_And she remembered articles in questionable Muggle magazines, hastily read in her mum’s loo, touting how the truly lucky wed their best friend._

_Could this—whatever_ this _had always been between them—become something they could share for the rest of their lives?_

_And with that last thought, she forced her mind back to the feel of the tips of his fingers against her skin; she leaned into his touch once more, turning to kiss his palm gently, and putting her hand atop his as he cupped her face._

_He kissed her again._

_Not with the cold precision of Viktor that somehow left her wanting._

_And not with the fumbling arrogance of Cormac that left her repulsed._

_Harry kissed her with an openness that was somehow beautiful in its sincerity and simplicity; his lips met hers with a flawless blend of reverence and confidence, tenderness and command._

_Because he was…Harry._

_Gods…_

_She allowed herself to smile into his next kiss._

_There was nothing else but this. And him. There had never been anything but him._

_Hermione felt something inside give way: all the memories and all the excuses, the lies she had told herself over the years, the fear, the denial that he was the one she wanted. That he’d always been the one._

_Letting all of it go didn’t make it any easier._

_It was hard to let yourself love someone you knew was destined to die._

*****

“Here,” Harry said, breezing back into the sitting room as if nothing were amiss and handing her a generous Firewhisky.

She took the tumbler from him and suppressed a sigh. It wasn’t as though she hadn’t wanted to end things with Ron months ago. And it wasn’t as though she had an excuse for taking her time doing it. She had just wanted Harry to come to her. And she wanted him to be free of Ginny when he did.

Was that so wrong?

Harry just always seemed rather…content in Ginny’s arms.

But what should she say to him, now that she was here?

“I don’t know where to start. Or what to say,” she admitted. “I just wanted to see you.” Hermione took a deep drink from the glass and set it on the table in front of her. The liquid seared her throat, but willed her hands to stay steady.

He looked at her curiously, warily, as if he knew her presence signified much more than that, and he was trying to suss out exactly why she had said the little she had. “I don’t know where to start, either,” he finally said.

She swallowed thickly. “Ron…it’s over between us. I broke it off. It seemed silly to continue if I never intend to marry him. I wanted you to know.”                                                                                        

“I figured.”

The distance in Harry’s two simple words had never been there before. _Ever_.

He took a swallow of his own Firewhisky and stared into the space over her left shoulder.

So she’d been wrong. Her eyes pricked again. “Maybe I shouldn’t have come.”

“You can always come here, Hermione. You know that,” he responded flatly.

“That’s no answer, Harry.”

“You’re right. It’s not,” he admitted. “I don’t know what to do.”

She laughed bitterly. “Then don’t do anything.”

“Have you ever known me to do nothing?”

At that, she saw his eyes change; the anguish vanished and he was the boy in the tent again, hers alone, snuggled next to her on her cot, and she was once more the focus of those deep green eyes, as if nothing else in the world mattered to him except her.

“Come here,” Harry whispered, beckoning her to him with a small gesture. The motion was so unlike what she had come to expect of the man he’d become, Hermione found herself on her feet and moving toward him without a thought. As she folded herself into the space next to him, he draped a heavy arm around her shoulders as if it had always belonged there.

*****

_The first evening Harry kissed her in the tent, she curled up next to him on the lumpy cot and fell asleep with his arms around her. Hours later, she awoke to the murmured sounds of Parseltongue, flitting on the edge of her consciousness._

_For the next two and a half weeks, they held each other every night, every chance, every moment. He was never farther than the tips of her fingers._

_Two and a half weeks later, Ron returned, and together, the boys destroyed the locket._

_Threaded within her utter relief that another Horcrux was gone was the raw disappointment that Ron had returned at all. Ron was the intruder threatening her fledgling relationship with Harry, thoroughly unwelcome in what Hermione had come to think of as their space._

_By an unexpressed, mutual agreement, they didn’t speak of the small beginning between them in front of Ron. Depending on when she thought about it, the silence seemed either insignificant or momentous._

_The evening following the locket’s demise was cold and wet._

_“I’m going out for some air,” Ron muttered, not quite sourly, but not pleasantly, either._

_“Hermione,” Harry said quickly. He reached for her hand, and gave it a squeeze before letting it go. The loss of it crushed her in a million tiny ways._

_“I’m sorry,” he said. “We just can’t right now.”_

_And the distance between his fingertips and her skin became infinite._

_“I know.” She couldn’t keep the sadness out of her reply._

_“We’ve a job to do, and we have to concentrate on that. And with Ron here…” He tucked a wayward curl behind her ear._

_“I know.”_

_“How about this: if we live through this mess, we’ll go from there.”_

_Hermione had just enough strength to nod._

*****

_Harry stumbled unsteadily up to Hermione and Ron on the stone staircase, his glasses slightly askew. Sticky, reddish-brown rivulets had dried into the lines on his face, fed from a gash in his forehead that had long ago stopped bleeding. His jacket was torn. His hands—gods, his_ hands _, the ones she still ached to hold—were trembling and black with dirt. Hermione wondered fleetingly if he would drop his wand._

_Harry glanced at her fingers intertwined with Ron’s, and his lips thinned. He raised his eyes to lock with hers, the green sharp with equal parts determination and jealousy._ I’ll allow it _, he seemed to say._ I don’t want you to be alone after I’m gone.

_“Take care of her,” he said sharply to Ron, without lifting his eyes from hers._

_“Sure, mate.”_

_Breaking his stare, Harry turned away and descended the stairs without looking back._

*****

_The sight of Harry’s limp body in Hagrid’s arms a lifetime later—or perhaps just an hour later, Hermione wasn’t sure—ruined her in ways she could had never imagined._

_Of course, she had known Harry’s likely fate. But the knowledge had done nothing to prepare her for witnessing it._

_Her knees slowly buckled; she sagged against Ron silently as the collapsed courtyard threatened to swallow her whole. She thought she would sick up; she thought her heart would stop. Her mouth went dry. Words evaporated on her tongue, as if everything she could think of to scream had suddenly vanished from existence._

_From behind her within the ruined walls, Ginny’s piercing cry announced her own despair._

_But a heartbeat later,_ she _was first the person Harry’s eyes sought as they opened; she, Hermione Jean Granger, with her unlikely hair and filthy denims, was the one he wanted to see after tasting death and returning blissfully, wonderfully, absurdly alive._

I made it, _his eyes seemed to say._ I’m here.

_But Ron had not let go of her hand._

_And the battle that she had thought long decided, began anew._

_In the ugly aftermath, amid the dust and grime and the wails of Molly, among the shattered bodies and crumbled stone, Harry approached her as she stood helpless, trapped within the Weasleys’ bubble of grief._

_“Ron?” he asked. His eyes were distant. Somehow, he seemed to already know that Ron had kissed her. She glanced behind her at her broken friend: a gangly, freckled boy who had promised Harry that he would take care of her. Protect her._

_He had._

_Ron was sobbing._

_She owed him…some comfort._

_“For now,” she said softly. Harry’s eyes darted over her shoulder, as if Harry was reappraising Ron’s worth in his appointed role._

_From behind her, Ginny’s hysteria became unable to ignore, and suddenly, Hermione was not the focus of Harry’s stubborn loyalty. She vaguely wondered how long it would be until she regained her place there._

_“Ginny?” she asked._

_“For now,” he echoed._

_And a lifetime changed in the span of a breath._

_Harry hugged her then, fiercely, as if he wanted to make sure she felt the echo of his arms around her long after he was gone. “Harry,” she said, her voice muffled in his shirt. “I—“_

_“I know,” he said, cutting across her softly and pressing a kiss into the top of her hair. “I love you, too.”_

_Harry released her and turned away. “Don’t forget me,” she whispered into the space where he stood a moment before._

_A breath later, she’d seen him take Ginny in his arms._

*****

“Hermione,” Harry began. “We need to—I need to—”

The door to the flat slammed, vibrating the two half empty glasses of Firewhisky on the table in front of them. Hermione jumped.

“Har?” Ginny’s piercing voice carried within the small flat, echoing over the bare walls.

“In here,” he called. “‘Mione’s here.” Hermione grimaced at the use of her hated Weasley-made nickname. She glanced at Harry and saw that the colour had drained from his face, and his lips were set in a grim line.

Ginny strode into the room, but Harry didn’t remove his arm from around her shoulders.

“Gin, you’re back.”

“Yeah.” Ginny shot Harry an odd look. “I am.”

Hermione struggled to free herself from beneath Harry’s hold, standing and brushing off her denims with shaking hands. After a quick, assessing glance at Hermione, Ginny settled into the space next to Harry that Hermione had abandoned. She kissed Harry on the cheek, and threaded her fingers in his.

Ginny continued, “I’m sure Harry told you. Can you believe it, ‘Mione? On Valentine’s Day of all days? Not at all predictable, this one.” She rolled her eyes and smiled. “Wanna see?”

Ginny thrust out her left hand to reveal an engagement ring that would have made the Malfoy family jeweler proud.

Hermione felt the blood drain from her own face in an echo a Harry’s from a moment before, and caught the back of a chair to steady herself to stop the room from tilting. Pressing her lips into a semblance of a smile, she prayed Ginny’s excitement distracted her from noticing that it never touched her eyes.

_I already watched you die, Harry. Now you going to leave me again. Forever._

This time, though, Ron wasn’t at her side to catch her.

“Congratulations,” Hermione choked out, trying and failing to swallow.

“Thanks!” Ginny said, beaming and staring down at her new ring. Harry, who had apparently recovered from Ginny’s entrance, reached over and tucked a length of long, red hair behind her ear affectionately.

Hermione flinched.

“I need to be off,” Hermione managed. “I’m sure you two have plans.”

“I bet Ron has a plan or two for this evening as well,” Ginny said with a wink, and glancing at Harry coyly. Hermione attempted to keep her smile.

“I think—” Harry began.

“Oi! I just realized in all the confusion that I left the dress I was going to wear tonight at The Burrow. I’ll be back in a few.” She kissed Harry on the cheek, breezed by Hermione, and headed toward the fireplace. “Assuming I don’t get stuck by Mum again. She’s alternating between hugging me, crying about her ‘baby girl’, and laughing uncontrollably.” With another, more elaborate eye roll, Ginny grabbed a handful of Floo powder. “I may need a Firewhisky or two when I get back, Har.”

Ginny disappeared in a wall of green flame.

“I—” Harry began again.

If she didn’t get out of Harry’s flat immediately, Hermione was certain she would collapse. She moved for the door and stumbled, nearly upending the glasses of Firewhisky on the table.

Harry grabbed her arm, stopping her mid-flight. “I would never have asked her if I thought there was any chance—”

“It’s fine. Actually, it’s brilliant. I’m happy for you both.” Her shaky voice betrayed the loss she felt to her marrow. There was nothing else left to say; all the rest was rubbish. She’d as good as said everything she needed to. Besides, he already knew everything that she hadn’t said.

_He knew._

He scrubbed one hand down his face, never letting her go with the other. “Hermione—”

“Harry. It’s fine. Really,” she repeated.

“Don’t leave. Not now. _Please_.”

“No. No. It’s okay. I knew you and Ginny—”

“It’s never going to be okay, Hermione!” he spat. The hardness in his eyes hit her in the gut, paralyzing her with its intensity. “He was supposed to take care of you— _for a while_. In the end, it was supposed to be me.” He released her and ran his hand through his undisciplined hair, and took a deep, ragged breath. “You knew that. You _know_ that,” he said a bit more calmly.

She couldn’t move. “Harry—”

“You forgot me.”

A part of her wanted to laugh hysterically at the absurdity of his words. Another part murmured _I wish I could_. She forced both voices silent.

“Don’t.”

“He bought a ring! And he dragged me with him to do it! Can you even imagine what that was like for me? Have you any idea the things he tells me about you two after a couple of Firewhiskys? We’re talking about _Ron_ here, Hermione! And you guys looked like you were…were…I don’t know! Happy! I thought you had changed your mind about us! I never said anything because I didn’t want to…I don’t know…intrude! I thought well, I’m at the shoppe anyway, and she’s as good as married to Ron, and Gin wanted—” He stopped abruptly, seeming to realize he shouldn’t mention his fiancée.

Harry took her by her upper arms, his voice pleading for understanding. “It wasn’t supposed to be forever—I was waiting for you. But you never came.”

“I was waiting for _you_ ,” she said simply. “Now there’s nothing for it, I suppose.”

She encircled her ring finger with the fingers from her other hand and twisted the empty skin. A tear escaped down her cheek.

“Nothing? No. No, there was something between us—we had _something_ , Hermione.”

“We had eighteen days,” she said, and pulled out of Harry’s grip to Apparate away.


End file.
